Nevertheless, in general the ancient playwrights displayed an amazing fertility of invention in explaining why their characters came out of doors and spoke in so public a place of matters which might more naturally have been reserved for greater privacy. Thus in Euripides’ _Alcestis_, Apollo explains his leaving Admetus’ palace on the ground of the pollution which a corpse would bring upon all within the house (vss. 22 f.) and Alcestis herself, though in a dying condition, fares forth to look for the last time upon the sun in heaven (vs. 206). Oedipus is so concerned in the afflictions of his subjects that he cannot endure the thought of making inquiries through a servant but comes forth to learn the situation in person (Sophocles’ _Oedipus the King_, vss. 6 f.); Carion is driven out of doors by the smoke of sacrifice upon the domestic altar (Aristophanes’ _Plutus_, vss. 821 f.); Polyphemus leaves his cave intending to visit his brothers for a carousal (cf. Euripides’ _Cyclops_, vss. 445 f. and 507 ff.). In Euripides’ _Andromache_, Hermione’s nurse, worn out in the attempt to save her mistress from self-destruction, hurries out and appeals to the chorus for assistance; a moment later Hermione herself escapes from the restraining clutches of her attendants and rushes upon the stage (vss. 816 ff.). Agathon cannot compose his odes in the winter time unless he bask in the sunlight (Aristophanes’ _Women at the Thesmophoria_, vss. 67 f.). In Plautus’ _The Haunted House_ (vss. 1 ff.) one slave is driven out of doors by another as the result of a quarrel. The lovelorn Phaedra teases for light and air (Euripides’ _Hippolytus_, vss. 178 ff.). Medea’s nurse apologizes for soliloquizing before the house with the excuse that the sorrows within have stifled her and caused her to seek relief by proclaiming them to earth and sky (cf. Euripides’ _Medea_, vss. 56 ff. and pp. 307 f., below). And Antigone informs her sister that she has summoned her out of doors in order to speak with her alone (Sophocles’ _Antigone_, vss. 18 f.), as if that were the most natural place in the world for a tête-à-tête. In connection with this last instance it must be remembered that the interior of ancient houses was arranged differently than ours and was more favorable for eavesdropping (cf. Terence’s _Phormio_, vss. 862-69).